I’m not sure what I did, but we have tomato plants to rival any other tomato plant anywhere. Before their mass collapsed the sturdy cages I bought for them, two of them were approaching six feet tall and over 6 feet in circumference. When the cages first started to collapse, I attempted to brace them up by tying them off to the brick columns on the front of my house, but even that has failed. Now, we just have this mass o’ tomatoes hanging off the front of my house.
It’s really kind of weedy looking to tell the truth, but the smell is incredible.
But the best thing is that it is now officially the start of harvest, and we’ll be canning our first tomatoes this weekend. I prefer tomato juice, so we’ll go that route. My closest estimate is that we have around 300 to 400 tomatoes actually on the vine at this point, so I’m hoping for at least 40 quart jars of tomatoes. To tell the truth, I have no idea how to do it, which brings me to the second half of my post.
I did an extensive search on the Internet to try and find instructions on making tomato juice. The only stuff I ever found that was even close was a site that wanted me to purchase “a system” including “equipment, instructions, and so forth.” Uh… No thanks. If it comes down to having to go that route, I have something far, far better than the Internet.
I have mom.
My mother has canned tomato juice as long as I can remember, and this weekend we’ll make a pilgrimage down to grandma’s house to be fully trained, instructed, and indoctrinated. It sounds so delicious, and I can’t think of anything better to do this weekend than stand in a hot, steamy kitchen canning tomatoes with my mother and family. Really.
Besides, moms are always better than Google.
